


When the Screws Fall Out

by Vera (Vera_DragonMuse)



Category: The Breakfast Club (1985)
Genre: HIV/AIDS, M/M, No Character Death, Panties, Strippers & Strip Clubs, Ten Years Later
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-09
Updated: 2014-09-09
Packaged: 2018-02-16 19:06:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2281212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vera_DragonMuse/pseuds/Vera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Screws fall out all the time, the world is an imperfect place." - John Bender, The Breakfast Club  </p>
<p>Their ten year reunion is accidental, a strip club run in with Bender on the stage and Brian in the audience.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When the Screws Fall Out

**Author's Note:**

> This started off as a light-hearted PWP, but it refused to stay that way. This story takes place in the early 90s and does depict a character dealing with an HIV diagnosis. I am not all a medical professional, please take nothing spoken of here as medical fact. No one dies in this story.

Look, Brian was only human. He made a good living at a software start up and he lived in an apartment that has a mysterious mold smell because he was too lazy to move, but at least he didn’t have to share it. Chicago fit around him like a chilled glove and he spent most nights home watching television. But he was only human. 

So sometimes he went to a hole in the wall strip joint with a wad of small bills and got a lap dance or whatever. It was usually filled with annoying bachelorette parties on the weekends with their silicon dicks and braying laughs, so he went on weekdays even though it's always sort of sad and half-empty. There were a few dancers that know him by name and it should probably make him feel like the biggest loser alive, but it was actually sort of nice. They made small talk with him and they seemed to like his broad hands and polite, if awkward, manners. 

"Hey, kid," the bouncer always greeted him and checked his I.D. as a matter of course. It was Tuesday night and there was a tight cluster of brightly dressed boys on one side of the stage and a few business types unwinding at the bar. 

Brian took his usual seat, a few rows back from the stage and the bartender sent over his Jack and coke that he'd nurse for most of the night. The Amazing Asscracker was on the stage. His real name was George and Brian sometimes gives him investment advice. George ground through a few songs, down to a shiny new thong. Brian made a mental note to compliment it later. He knew entirely too much about the wardrobe of semi-naked people and the expense thereof these days. 

"And now gentlemen," the DJ came on, halfway through a coughing fit, "the newest addition to our stable, meet the studly Clint Haaaardwood!" 

Brian braced himself for cheesy western music and instead was treated to 'Highway to Hell'. Instead of a ridiculous cowboy, it was black boots laced all the way up to the knee and painted on jeans, black t-shirt under a long black leather trenchcoat and sunglasses, tan skin, long dark hair and all masculine swagger. 

Brian's mouth went dry. Even before the first struck pose, unchanged defiance with wide flung arms and wide planted feet, he knew. He knew what was under that costume. Or had known. He had run hands over that bruised and burned skin, uncovered it in the darkness of a forgotten back hallway, nearly a decade ago. 

"Jesus fuck," he whispered to himself as Bender charged the pole and slung himself up with the same kinetic anger he'd once used to take down bookcases. 

It was the nastiest, most athletic strip show Brian had ever seen. Bender hung upside down from the pole, his long jacket thrown off his arms to pool at the bottom. Then he monkey climbed up, sneered at the crowd, hanging on one handed as he worked off one boot, then the other. 

When he disdainfully jumped down, it was into a rock and roll kneel, that he easily bent all the way backwards into, his hair cascading over the side of the stage. He bit bills out of the colorful boys hands and spat them back out into his abandoned jacket. 

The t-shirt got lost during some kind of handstand/back flip and goddamn, Bender had built on muscle, a six-pack with the same livid scar slashed just above his navel. He played into it, running his fingers over the old flesh with a challenging look. 

He didn't bend over to take off the jeans like a lot of the dancers did. Instead, he popped a button...then another. Goddamn, button fly and even the tired businessmen had perked up, circling the stage like sharks. Bender ignored them, their bills falling at his bare feet as meaningless to him as the stage lights. 

The last button finally opened wide and there...god. A buzz started in Brian's head, a rattling purring yes yes yes. Bender wasn't wearing a thong, but what could only be women's silken panties, pitch black and barely containing him. When did a careless spin, rhinestone studs on the ass read 'Fuck You'. Black silk and shine stretched over pure muscle. 

Brian had never gotten to touch that ass. He'd been run off too early, too easily scared by Bender's bluster. Charging away from Sherman and everything the confined air of the place meant. He’d asked around, quietly, when he visited, but no one knew or seemed to give a shit where John Bender had gone.

But that had been a decade ago. 

Tonight, Brian pulled out his wad of bills and pressed them into the right person's hand. They knew him, after all and he wasn't a bad sort of guy. So he slipped backstage into the shadows and waited. Bender would go on twice more, but Brian could be patient. He had nothing to rush home for. 

"Jesus fuck," Bender muttered when he came into change at last. Brian had forgotten who had picked that particular curse up from. 

Brian watched as Bender discarded his costume, except for the panties. Those apparently stayed as looser jeans and a far older baggier t-shirt got pulled on. Then a denim jacket and a cigarette jammed between thin lips. 

"They should make you a headliner," Brian said casually, biting back a grin when Bender jumped, hand going to whatever weapon he had tucked in his pockets. 

"What the fuck?" Bender demanded. Brian stepped into the light. 

"Still charming after all these years," Brian smiled, casual as he could. "I like the panties. It's a nice touch." 

"No way," Bender's hand dropped away. "What the hell are you doing in a joint like this?"   
"Could ask you the same thing, but we both know the answers already," Brian shrugged. 

"You worked a long shift. There's a diner down the block. Want dinner?" 

Bender hovered on the edge, but when all Brian did was wait placidly for the answer, he heaved out a jagged sigh. 

"Sure. Why the fuck not?" 

Bender ordered pancakes and bacon, eating in neat ravenous bites while Brian worked his way through a slice of pie. They didn’t make small talk, Bender kept glancing up at Brian under sooty eyelashes with curiosity. It was nearly coy. 

"Where are you staying?" Brian asked. 

"Got a place with a few guys I know," Bender shrugged. "I just got to town a few weeks ago. Figure I can sort out better." 

"I live alone," Brian sipped coffee. "It’s not much of a place." 

"Quiet must be nice." 

"Uh huh." 

Bender didn’t ask and Brian didn’t invite him, but they both wound up at Brian’s apartment anyway. There wasn’t any question about Bender sleeping on the couch either. The second the door slammed shut behind them, Bender was on Brian like he was the next course after dinner. 

How had Brian forgotten this? The way Bender’s hands spanned over his back or the way he bit kisses over Brian’s collarbone would’ve been nostalgia tinged if it hadn’t been so electrifying. There were differences, of course. Somewhere along the way, Bender had learned to bruise instead of bleed, scramble instead of scratch. Brian lost his shirt without it getting ripped and he was allowed to touch without smart ass critique. Maybe that had more to do with Brian’s gained experience though. After all, time had given Brian bulk to add to his stretched frame and they were better matched now. 

When Bender tried to shove Brian around, he met with more resistance and he didn’t seem to be trying nearly as hard. Instead, he actually let Brian push back. Bender’s t-shirt made quick acquaintance with the floor while Brian licked his way down the impressive six pack. He slides down the zipper of Bender’s jeans, an easier reality to the fantasy of the button fly. 

The panties felt better than they looked as it turned out. Brian got to run his hands over the silk of them, groping Bender through them. Hard, the head of Bender’s cock pushed out and up. It would look faintly ridiculous on someone else, but Bender had always been invulnerable to the awkward. Instead, he looked like a Calvin Klein model leaning against the stark white wall. 

Brian leaned back to appreciate the picture of it all. There were silver rings on both of Bender’s hands, thick pieces of tortured metal. They flashed in the dim light as Bender sunk his fingers into Brian’s hair and drew him upward. It ruined Brian’s plan to blow him, but he couldn’t complain when the tip of Bender’s tongue flickered over Brian’s bottom lip. 

He’d remembered. Brian groaned, blood rushing to the surface of his skin in a prickling tidal wave. They’d discovered that hot spot together, the way Brian’s bottom lip was connected straight to his dick and apparently, Bender had committed it to memory. Brian tried to remember something equally intimate, but it had always seemed like Bender had been holding him at a distance. 

“I’ve got a bed,” Brian said instead, rubbing the back of Bender’s neck. “might even have clean sheets.” 

“Such luxury,” Bender rolled his eyes, but he let Brian lead the way. 

The bed was unmade. Brian pushed the tangle of sheets and blankets out of the way, then reached for Bender. A solid wall of heat pressed Brian into the mattress. He could run his hands over Bender’s back now, relearning the dip of his spine. With a grin, he hooked his leg over Bender’s thigh at just the right angle and flipped them, Bender landing with a dazed look. 

Brian took advantage, stripping Bender’s jeans out of the way and biting at the ridge of his collarbone. 

“Guess someone did some growing up,” Bender raked his nails over Brian’s shoulders. 

Brian waited for Bender to stop him as he ran his hands over the corded muscles of his thighs. The panties didn’t soften any of Bender’s lines, didn’t change the essential tight thrumming of aggression that always seemed to linger just under the Bender’s skin. If anything, they were a warning sign. A last reminder that the man under him had never been a safe person to be near. 

“You just gonna look?” Bender rolled his hips upward in a sliding tease. 

Instinctively, Brian put a hand to the center of Bender’s chest, held him there and grinned, all teeth, 

“Maybe.” 

“Shit,” head falling hard against the pillow, Bender’s hips rose and fell in a silent plea. 

Shimmying down the bed, Brian got himself into the right position to show off the things he’d learned in the intervening decade. He pulled down Bender’s panties just enough to gain access, before beginning a painstaking acquaintance with Bender’s cock with the tip of his tongue. He’d forgotten how silent Bender got, how his breath became faint pants as if the slightest noise might spook Brian away. He hadn’t forgotten how Bender’s hands curved over his shoulders, instead of into his more easily reachable hair. 

Time had gifted them both with more stamina and Brian’s jaw ached by the time Bender came with a stuttering sigh. Before Brian could so much as wipe his mouth, Bender was turning over and reaching for the drawer in Brian’s nightstand. 

“What’re you doing?” 

“Looking for your lube, genius. You’re not fucking me without it.” 

“You mean I can...” 

“No, I just figured I’d make an offer than leave you high and dry,” Bender rolled his eyes, fingers closing on the half used up tube of KY. 

It seemed wise not to point out that was utterly in line with the way things had gone with them all those years ago. Then again, they’d been dumb kids then. Now they were slightly wiser adults and Bender was pitching the tube of lube at Brian’s head with a smirk. 

“Better know what do with it.” 

“Goes into your hair, right?” Brian smirked. 

“Ooooh, look who talks back,” John pillowed his chin on his crossed arms. “Sometime before I fall asleep, please.” 

“Oh trust me,” Brian slicked his fingers. “You’re not sleeping anytime soon.” 

It was a strange thing to sink into Bender’s body. There was no give to him, no soft place anywhere, yet there was no fight or violence about it either. All the playful wrestling and biting fell by the wayside as John spread himself impossibly wide. It made Brian slow down, go a little soft himself. He gentled his hands, rubbing circles over Bender’s biceps and shoulders as he eased in. He waited for Bender to bitch about it or anything else, but a silence fell over them. 

The minutes slid into a liquid meaninglessness and if it wasn’t for the building pressure in his balls, Brian might’ve carried on indefinitely, lost in undulation of Bender’s muscles and the slick sweat of their skin. His orgasm was a disappointment, ending the delirious connection and forcing him to fall to one side, his hands still relentlessly petting Bender’s skin. 

“Gonna fall asleep on me, genius?” Bender asked softly and that was the last thing Brian heard before he drifted into the darkness. 

In the morning, Briand discovered that Bender slept on his stomach, one arm tucked under the pillow and the other encroaching on Brian’s side of the bed. Brian curved around the sharp point and fell back asleep. He dreamed about an endless white hallway full of doors that led to the identical rooms. Just one of those things. 

The alarm went off at seven, calling Brian to his work. It didn’t take long to brush his teeth and turn himself back into a professional human being. When he pulled on his suit jacket, Bender’s eyes opened to half mast. Brian looked down at him, dark hair spread over the pillowcase and the ripple of dark blue sheet around his waist. 

“Use my shower if you want. There’s food in the fridge. Lock up if you’re leaving,” he smoothed a hand down over his tie.

“Yeah?” Bender rolled over in a full bodied stretch, the sheet dipping dangerously low. Brian leaned over, planting a hand on Bender’s chest and kissing him long, wet and lewd. 

“Yeah,” he decided as he straightened up. “I’ll be back around six.” 

The sum total of Brian’s possessions would probably net Bender two or three thousand dollars. None of them were irreplaceable. The look on Bender’s face when Brian left him behind on the bed? The Schrodinger's Cat game of will he or won’t he be there that preoccupied Brian all day? Worth a million or two. Brian even made a bet with himself that if Bender wasn’t there then he would buy a bottle of Scotch. If Bender was gone with the television, Brian would finally splurge and buy a bigger set. That way, he won no matter the outcome. 

Brian liked winning. The cash prize of coming home, sliding in the key and pushing open the door to reveal Bender on his couch was some kind of ultimate jackpot. The jeans had made a reappearance, but the t-shirt was Brian’s. A relic from college, so that Bender proudly declared ‘Engineers Do It In Stages’’ across his chest. 

“I’m starving,” Bender said in lieu of hello, his head dropping back to the arm of the couch. His feet were cross over the other arm, the arches surprisingly high and delicate. “All you had to eat here was cereal and frozen shit.” 

“Bachelor food,” Brian shrugged and kicked off his shoes. “We can order pizza.” 

“I’m starting to wonder how you earned that new body of yours,” Bender’s grin was still razor sharp, but Brian read something tender there too. Wishful thinking, maybe. 

“Not that new,” he lifted up Bender’s legs, sat down, dropped the legs into his lap. “I bulked up in college. Just overdue for it, I guess. I run, most mornings.” 

“Yeah, of course you do,” Bender rolled his eyes. “Cardiovascular bullshit.” 

“And what? You’ve got abs of steel from watching television?” 

It turned out that Bender could do a hundred push ups at a go and didn’t mind proving it. 

“Two years for B and E,” he explained, one arm tucked behind his back and that was just showing off, but damn if it wasn’t working. “Too much time to think. Working out helped. Then I got my GED for something to do.” 

“After that?” Brian watched the lean lines of Bender’s body flex under the ancient cotton shirt. 

“Construction mostly. Stripping was supposed to be a one night thing, but the money and the hours were better. Last place I worked got busted for prostitution and I didn’t like how things were looking, so here I am.” 

“Lucky me,” Brian said wryly. 

“Lucky you,” Bender flipped over and started on sit-ups. “Let me guess: John Q. Normal. Big degree, shit job and a valley of tears over wasted potential.” 

“Guess so. Job is a little better than shit. I don’t feel like anything got wasted. No one gets to tell me what to do anymore.” 

“No boss?” 

“Technically. But I coded the only program that makes us any money, so he leaves me alone as long as I show up and put in my eight hours. Closest thing to freedom you can get without being a millionaire.” 

“Still. Mommy and Daddy must be unhappy.” 

“Wouldn’t know,” Brian turned on to his side. “They stopped talking to me when I came home with my ‘special friend’. My sister calls sometimes.” 

“Yeah?” Bender huffed and dropped flat to the floor. “Haven’t seen my folks since I left Shermer.” 

“I thought it would feel better than it does,” Brian admitted. 

They were only a foot or two apart, Bender on the floor and Brian on the couch. The world felt small in the sunset gloom. Brian reached out, trailed his fingers along Bender’s arm. He waited to be shoved away, but Bender just grabbed up his wandering hand and enclosed it in his own. 

“I had a plan to burn down the house when I left,” Bender shifted. “Was gonna smoke a joint from across the street and watch. I even bought the kerosene.” 

“Why didn’t you?” 

“I don’t know. I was all hyped up and then...it just sort of went away. The whole itch. Caught the first bus out instead. Didn’t look back.” 

There wasn’t even a hole left in Bender’s ear to show the place a diamond earring had once sat. It was if their entire childhood had been scabbed over, not quite healed yet, but distant and only a little achey. Brian slid off the couch, jammed himself in next to Bender. 

“You gotta work tonight?” 

“Eight to ten.” 

“Got to go change?” 

“Nah, I keep some stuff there.” 

“Let’s go out then.” 

They shared a few entrees at the local Chinese place, rice spilled over their plates. It was weirdly comfortable though they barely spoke. Bender invaded Brian’s space almost immediately, trapping one of Brian’s legs between his own. They parted ways afterwards without a word, but six hours later, Brian was torn away from late night canned laughter by a knock at the door. Bender pushed inside, a fat duffel bag over one shoulder and a suitcase in the other. 

“Caught some asshole going through my shit. I’m crashing here tonight.” It wasn’t a question, but Bender caught Brian’s eye from under long lashes and that part was. 

“Rent is due next Tuesday. You good for two hundred a month?” 

“Can’t you just take it out of my ass?” Bender groaned. 

“I’m not rich enough to have a kept boy.” 

And that was as much as they ever talked about it. Bender moved in and stayed. He took over half of Brian’s closet and two drawers in his bureau. He used Brian’s hair product then bitched about ‘cheapass Head and Pube bullshit’ until Brian bought better stuff. 

“See?” Bender ran a hand through Brian’s curls. “Gotta treat this stuff right or you look like a damn brillo pad.” 

Brian didn’t give a goddamn what his hair looked like, but he did enjoy the silk strands of Bender’s hair shivering over his skin, so it was a win all around. 

On the first third Tuesday, two wrinkled up c-notes appeared on the kitchen counter without fanfare or note. Brian folded them into his wallet and wrote out the check without comment. It was satisfying, taking the payment. His rent was more like seven hundred than four, but it was more of a principal than a financial point. 

Lots of people had tried to own Bender over the years. Something in his raw defiance provoked the response and ended everything in bloodshed. So Brian didn’t try. He didn’t ask where Bender was going beyond making the occasional dinner plan. Sometimes he’d find receipts to mysterious businesses crumpled on the nightstand, but he let them be. They had no agreements, no understandings. They shared an apartment, a bed, their bodies when they felt like it and that was all Brian really cared about. 

Well, mostly. 

“This a thing?” He did ask, two months into their arrangement. 

“I’m not a drag queen or whatever,” Bender squared up, probably unconsciously for a fight. He was naked, but for the black silk cupped over his groin. It was a new pair with a hint of lace around the edges. 

“I think it’s hot,” Brian said carefully. 

“That’s because you’re a deeply disturbed individual,” Bender’s shoulders collapsed back down and his voice had dropped low. 

“Kinks are a perfectly normal expression of sexual desire.” 

“Whatever, Freud.” 

Ten minutes later, they were fucking against the wall, Bender’s panties shoved down just low enough for access. Brian bit into the the curve of Bender’s shoulder until Bender let out an unholy noise and came in a splatter, forever staining the paint. 

All of Bender’s panties were black. Sometimes when Bender was out, Brian would put his hand into the drawer, the slick materials sliding through his fingers like an inky beast. He never took them out, but he thought about them while he jerked off in the shower. He’d figured that the stomach churning effect of that olive skin, slice of muscle and dark frills would wear off eventually. 

It had been four months, but hey, some of these things took more time than others. 

Sometimes, Brian still went to the club. Bender didn’t seem to care one way or the other, mostly ignoring him when he did show. The other strippers didn’t seem to know what to make of Bender and after a few rounds of poking at him, found it safer to leave him be. It was doubtful anyone linked the rumpled curly haired man with the asshole new stripper who generated twenties with his leather and lace. So it was surprising when George made his way to Brian’s table with a tight look one night and said, 

“I think you should take your boyfriend home.” 

“My what?” 

“He’s sick. Some of the guys thought he was high at first, glassy eyed or whatever, but he doesn’t touch that shit as far as I can tell. Right?” 

“Uh, right,” Brian wracked his brain and had to come up with a ‘No’. Aside from a joint or two, shared between them, Bender seemed clean. Even the joints had started off as Brian’s, come to think of it. “Where is he?” 

“Back room.” 

Bender was leaning against a sink, trying to look casual while a tiny slip of a boy covered in glitter flitted around him with worried hands dancing patterns over sweating skin. The fact that Bender was allowing it chilled Brian immediately. 

“Hey,” Brian shouldered the boy aside. 

“Hey,” Bender met his gaze. His eyes were glassy and there was sweat beading up on his forehead. “Where the fuck did you come from?”

“I was summoned. You’re scaring the children.” 

“I’m not high,” Bender grounded out. 

“Okay,” Brian put his hand to the side of Bender’s neck. It wasn’t exactly scientific, but Brian didn’t need a thermometer to gauge the heat radiating off Bender’s skin. “You should come home.” 

“I’ve got work.” 

“Go, man, ” George repeated shakily from behind Brian. “You’re gonna get the rest of us sick.” 

“Like I fucking care,” Bender pushed off the sink, then nearly collapsed back into it when Brian pushed back. “Goddamnit!” 

“Look, you wanna go out there and collapse on stage, you go ahead,” Brian readied himself for a counterattack. “Or you can walk the four blocks home now and pass out on the couch. If you’re not an asshole about it, I might find it somewhere in me to buy you some Tylenol.” 

“Big spender.” 

Bender reached out and Brian prepared for the punch. Instead, the arm fell heavy around his shoulders and Bender pulled himself upright using Brian as a crutch. 

“Can you get me his bag?” Brian asked George and gave him a smile when it was shoved into his free hand. “Thanks.” 

“Just get his plagued ass home,” George rolled his eyes. “Some assholes.” 

“Fuck you,” Bender muttered into Brian’s shoulder. 

They stumbled back to the apartment, Bender’s weight dragging Brian into the kind of stride generally seen in the wake of a closing bar. When the door ceded to Brian’s one handed attempts to open it, there was a near collision with the doorframe. Out of sheer bullheadedness, Brian bypassed the couch and took the last steps to the bed, dumping Bender unceremoniously onto the mattress. 

Instead of swearing at him, Bender face planted on his pillow with muffled, “Thank fuck.” 

“Turn over, I’ll get your boots.” 

“I can undress my own damn self.” 

“Okay, have fun with that. I’ll get Tylenol.” 

There was a convenience store just a block down. Brian grabbed up ginger ale and Saltines while he was at it. Vague memories of chicken broth logged crackers surfaced as he waited on line, so he went back and got a few cans of soup too. 

The sound of retching greeted him on his return. He discovered Bender slumped half into the bathtub, the toilet flushed, but the terrible smell lingering. Apparently Bender had managed to get his boots off, but had given up on the rest. He was coughing in a disturbingly wet way. 

“You gonna puke again?” Brian asked from the doorway. 

“Probably.” 

“Awesome,” Brian leaned down and tugged on the hem of Bender’s t-shirt. 

It was a miserable night. Bender threw up three more times, shaky, clammy and weak by the end of it. Brian got him back to the bed eventually, piling comforters on him and climbing in beside him to generate a little heat. He was no better in the morning, fighting off Brian’s attempts ‘to water me like a fucking houseplant’ and then the afternoon brought on a bout of dry heaving that was exhausting to watch let alone participate in. 

“Clinic,” Brian determined and it was a testament to how fucked Bender was that he just nodded carefully like his skull was full of broken glass. 

The clinic smelled of urine and bleach, but the receptionist was kind and found a blanket when she saw how violently Bender was shivering. The nurse that eventually saw them was all practicality with steady hands and unfriendly eyes. 

“It probably just needs to pass on its own,” she determined after perfunctory exam, “but I’m going to take a blood sample just in case.” 

“In case of what?” Brian asked. 

“You never know,” she turned her back to him as she shoved up Bender’s sleeve. There were old burn marks there, perfectly round. Brian wondered if the nurse saw them or if she’d been trained to look around old damage and only take in the new. “We’ll call in a few days if it shows anything. Until then, make sure he drinks fluids.” 

“Hear that?” Brian grumbled. 

“Fluids,” Bender growled. “Not flat fucking soda.” 

By the next day, Bender was eating soup and toast and generally being a pain in the ass. Brian went back to work to get away from him and routine returned. Three runs, three work days, three dinners eaten across from each other and Brian let it lull him into complacency. 

The phone call came in when they were making out with intent on the couch. Bender was straddling Brian when the ringer split the muffled quiet. 

“Who the fuck-” Bender reached over Brian’s head to pick it up, the phone cord tangling in Brian’s hair. “Hello?” 

“Why the hell did you pick up?” Brian mouthed into Bender’s neck. 

They were close enough that Brian could hear the other end of the conversation, a tinny voice: “I would like to speak with Mr. John Bender.” 

“You’ve got ‘em,” Bender rolled his eyes and winked down at Brian, tugging the cord free and yanking out a few hairs in the process which started a half-hearted slap fight. 

“This is Dr. Pim from the Regional Clinic. I’ve got some bad news for you, son. I think you better come down for an appointment as soon as possible.” 

The laughter drained out of Brian’s throat as the color disappeared from Bender’s face. 

“Can’t you tell me over the line?” 

“I really think it’s better to do this in person. I’ll be here another two hours if you don’t want to wait.” 

Bender croaked an agreement, leaned forward to let the phone fall into the cradle. Brian hung on to Bender’s shirt, twisting his fingers into the loose cotton. They regarded each other across an impossible distance. 

“Okay,” Brian heaved out a ragged breath. “Let’s go then.” 

“I don’t need you to-” Bender’s lips twisted into the beginning of a snarl. 

“Yeah, well. I do.” He pulled Bender down, practically cracking their skulls together. He kissed him with a ferocity that welled up from the deep. “Got it?” 

“Tough guy,” Bender growled, but gave in with disturbing ease. 

They made the trip to the clinic together. Brian lingered by the door of the exam room, making way when a white lab coat flashed into the doorway. Dr. Pim was a trim man with bushy grey eyebrows. He surveyed them both as he took his place on the rolling stool with a manilla folder clutched in his hands. 

“So?” Bender leaned forward, hair sweeping forward to cover his face. When had it grown so long? 

“According to your blood test, you’re HIV positive,” Dr. Pim tapped his fingers against the folder, the tiny sound the only one in the room. When Bender didn’t respond, he pressed on, “ It isn’t unusual to get flu like symptoms a few weeks after contracting the virus, so it’s a good chance that you haven’t had it long. I would still recommend that you contact all your past sexual partners and encourage them to get tested. Have you received or donated blood recently?”

Bender said nothing. 

“Not in the last four months,” Brian supplied for him. Dr. Pim glanced towards the door, took in Brian’s presence and nodded fractionally. “Has he been using intravenous drugs?” 

“Definitely not.” 

“I’m going to die,” Bender said as blandly as ‘We’re out of milk’. 

“You’re going to live,” Dr. Pim hesitated and then reached out, one hand covering the white knuckled join of Bender’s interlocked fingers. “There’s been progress with antivirals. I can give you some initial prescriptions, but I’d recommend seeing a specialist for continued treatment. It’s possible to stave off AIDS for a number of years.” 

Bender didn’t move away from the doctor’s touch. He didn’t move at all. 

“Do you have a recommendation for a specialist?” Brian asked in his stead. 

“I can you a card,” almost reluctantly, Dr. Pim pulled away and got to his feet. “I know this is a shock, but if any questions occur to you, please feel free to call.” 

When the door swung shut, it took all the air in the room with it. The reality of what had just happened sank under Brian’s initial cool response and set his stomach on fire. He couldn’t move, couldn’t offer a word of comfort. Bender didn’t look up at him, didn’t really seem to be breathing. It was a relief when the doctor returned, a business card held aloft. 

“Dr. Brighton is a personal friend and I’d trust her with my own life,” Dr. Pim offered the card to Bender, but he didn’t move to take it. “Mr. Bender? I would also recommend a counselor of some kind, what you’re going through-” 

“Thank you,” Brian took the card. “Um, would it be possible for me to get tested today?” 

Apparently that was what it took to shake Bender from his stupor. He looked to Brian with horror written in the tight lines of his mouth. They’d been mostly careful together, but mostly didn’t really cut it. Every one of their mistakes and skips played vividly in Brian’s mind now. 

“Roll up your sleeve,” said Dr. Pim. 

It would only occur to Brian much later how lucky they’d been. To find a clinic where the nurse would be suspicious enough to test someone with a run of the mill flu and yet, liberal enough to hire a doctor that didn’t blink when presented with a gay couple. Just then, he felt the furthest thing from lucky as Dr. Pim drew blood and promised a call either way in a few days. 

They walked back to the apartment like zombies, shuffling and hardly aware of each other. Inside the safety of their own walls, Bender walked straight into the bathroom and locked the door behind him. The shower started up immediately, the drum of water and pipes drowning out whatever other noise might be made inside. 

Brian sat down in the same space he’d left behind barely an hour before. The clock on the VHS player blinked 12:00 at him over and over. Numbly, he tried to remember if Bender was supposed to go to work tonight. Was he going to be late now? Would he go? 

The shower went on and on, long after the hot water would’ve given up. 

Brian leaned his head back, stared up at the ceiling with it’s growing stain. He could afford better than this, he thought. He’d been so conservative these past few years, living on the bare minimum most of the time. There was money in the bank, waiting for...what? 

It took him a minute to register when the water finally stopped and the bathroom door opened. Bender was soaked, still in his t-shirt and underwear which dripped onto the floor.

“I’m going to bed,” he declared, throat raw. 

“And soak the mattress?” Brian got to his feet. “Just...stay there.” 

Bender stayed. He let Brian run a towel of him, strip off the saturated t-shirt and scroll black lace down his legs and away. He did catch up Brian’s hands when he tried to dry his hair. 

“I’ll just...tomorrow,” Bender stalked toward the bedroom. 

“Yeah,” Brian followed, unwilling now to be alone. “Tomorrow.” 

The lights were turned off and they were under the covers, but neither of them even pretended to sleep. Instead, they stayed on their sides of the mattress and listened to the traffic rattle by. At dawn, Brian went for his run because...what else? The city woke up around him, unchanged from yesterday or the day before. When he got back, Bender was still under the blankets, eyes closed. 

Brian went to work. He locked himself into his office with his inbox, shifting through memos and writing a few of his own. All the while, he was hyper aware of his heartbeat loud and angry, asking _Sick? Sick? Sick? Sick?_

When there was no busywork left, he turned on his computer. Files sprang up, listing projects and suggesting others. A name caught his eye and then a thought. Last night it had been a towel, rough in his hands, but today it could be something more helpful. It took him hours, carrying him through lunch and most of the afternoon. A few phone calls finished the job. 

The apartment echoed when he got home and for a panicked moment, he thought that Bender might have actually fled. As if leaving behind the apartment would slough off what had happened there. But the pair of sturdy work boots sat by the door and a long black coat still hung over the closet door. 

The faint smell of smoke drew Brian into the kitchen. The window as propped open, screen resting against the wall and Bender sat on the sill, legs hanging out over the four story drop. A pack of cigarettes rested on the kitchen table, the cellophane torn away. 

“Hey,” Brian said quietly. 

“Hey,” Bender replied, voice still sounding like it came through ground meat. 

“What’re you doing?” 

“What’s it look like?” 

“Bender.” 

“Don’t call me that,” Bender shifted on the window sill and Brian’s breath caught in his throat. 

“What should I call you?” 

“John. It’s my damn name. Someone should call me by my name, don’t you think?” 

“Okay, John. What’re you doing?” The name tasted odd in Brian’s mouth, but he’d agree to a thousand worse things in that moment. 

“I am contemplating my own mortality, Bri-an,” John sing-songed. 

“You’ll probably survive. It’s not that long a fall. Just be that guy they talk about on the news tonight with the two broken legs.”

“They don’t talk about people like us on the news,” John snorted. 

Brian couldn’t hold back, he crossed the kitchen floor in a flash, practically gluing himself to John’s back. To his profound relief, John tensed and then released, leaning into the desperate embrace, giving Brian most of his weight. The cigarette went on burning in his hand. 

“I got you health insurance,” Brian told him, hooking his chin over John’s shoulder for good measure. “The card’ll be here in a few days.” 

“You just got me health insurance? They selling that in Rite Aid now?” 

“I hacked one of our clients and put you in on their permanent disability list. It’s a big company with a bad rep for paperwork. No one’ll look too close.” 

John started to shake and for a horrifying moment, Brian thought he was crying. Then the rusty hack of John’s laugh filled the air. 

“Brian fucking Johnson. A criminal.” 

“Yeah, well,” Brian laughed along with him, the tightness in his chest easing fractionally. “If they can’t keep me out, they deserve to get ripped off.” 

The card came the same day they found out that Brian was clean. Dr. Pim called as promised and Brian’s relief was coupled with a near crippling guilt. He looked to John (always John now) with an apology on his lips. 

“About damn time something went right,” John said before Brian could get a word around here. “If it got you too...” 

The blank didn’t get filled it, but it left plenty of room for interpretation. 

That night they fucked for the first time since finding out. They used one of the new condoms from the economy pack Brian had bought and casually placed on top of the bureau as though it weren’t a statement of intent. John had picked it up, raised an eyebrow and then spent a half hour casually pelting Brian with tiny packets while he tried to read. Until Brian tackled him to the bed. 

If it was a little more desperate than usual, than... well.... that was to be expected wasn’t it? When Brian turned over to go to sleep, John turned with him and, with a tentativeness that definitely did not make Brian’s chest ache, put his arm around Brian’s hips. It was easy to move incrementally backwards in silent acceptance. 

That’s how they fell asleep after that. The animal heat of John’s body unwinding the tension in Brian’s back. 

Brian went with John to see Dr. Brighton. John scowled at him all through the bus ride, sharing the joy with anyone that considered sitting close to them. Brian just rolled his eyes and paged through a newspaper. 

There was a rubber plant in the waiting room along with tired magazines. John’s knee jostled up and down, shaking the row of seats, but there was no one else there to annoy. 

“Hey, turns out aubergine is in this season,” Brian tipped a wrinkled page at John, fluttering a model’s pouty face. “Think I’d look good in purple leggings?” 

“Shut up, Johnson,” John groaned, slumping in his seat. 

“I dunno. I think you should write a letter to the editor. This new grunge moment is kind of ripping off your look.” 

John raised an eyebrow in disdain, but when Brian showed him a picture of girls in flannel and artfully ripped jeans he upped the eyebrow with a snarl. 

“Idiots. I didn’t dress like that cause it was fashionable. Was the only goddamn way to keep warm in the winter without a fancy coat.” 

“Did have the side effect of making you look dangerous as hell though.” 

“Sure,” Bender snorted. “Dangerous to skinny geniuses and trust fund babies.” 

The coat and flannel and t-shirt and motorcycle boots hadn’t really been dangerous enough for Brian either. He’d been taken in by them instead of warned away, seduced as if John’s fraying gloves held fruit from the tree of knowledge. It had been unfair, callous and thrill seeking as Claire’s backseat makeout sessions with John had been. An exploitive trip to an unknown country. 

But it all seemed so far away now. Even if John was dangerous in new ways, carrying poison in his veins and balls. A danger not just to Brian’s health, but to his quavering future. Dangerous because he had become important to Brian in a way no one else had been in countless years. 

Maybe ever. 

Brian took a sharp breath, the thought catching him unguarded. Why here of all places? Why now as John made faces at a teeny bopper magazine dressed not in his old armor, but one of Brian’s baggy sweatshirts with cuffs that covered his hands and faded jeans? Why now when his hands were no longer protected by gloves, but left open to the air, vulnerable and trembling ever so slightly? 

Why now when John wasn’t an undiscovered country at all, but a neighborhood that Brian knew so well? 

“Wannabe punk kids,” John tossed the magazine aside. 

“Mr. Bender?” The receptionist leaned over her counter. “The doctor will see you now.” 

Dr. Brighton’s office looked nothing like the clinic’s sterile exam room. There were clusters of photos on the walls of far off places interspersed with degrees and certifications. Her desk was massive, but when they walked in, she was sitting on the guest side and gestured them into chairs right beside her. She was a woman made of sharp angles and short spiky haircut. 

“Welcome to the fight,” she said gravely after they were all introduced. “We’re going to be waging war with this virus, John and I promise you that I’ll use every weapon in my arsenal.” 

John leaned into her, all ears and Brian could’ve kissed her. 

She loaded John down with three future appointments for blood draws, prescriptions and warnings about dosage adjustments with brisk strokes of her pen. 

“If you experience any side effects, make an appointment immediately,” she said as she shook John’s hand. “Do you have a support system in place?” 

John’s gaze slid over to Brian, evaluating, “Yeah. I think I’m good.” 

Brian squared his shoulders while Dr. Brighton gave him the once over. 

“I’ve got reading for you both then.” 

The pamphlet Brian got had a lot to say on the subject of depression and grief. He read it at his desk at work, bottles of pills in their orange plastic snug in his briefcase. John had passed all the paperwork onto him with seeming carelessness and Brian figured it was the least he could do really. 

“So apparently,” he told John over pizza, “there’s stages to grief.” 

“Apparently, you’re still a nerd,” John stole a piece of pepperoni from Brian’s slice. “I can’t believe you already did your homework.” 

“I’m a motivated student,” Brian said blandly. 

John went back to work. After a few nights, he woke Brian up on his way in. 

“What the fuck?” Brian slurred. 

“Nice language,” John laughed at him. There was glitter smeared over his forehead. “I want to show you something.” 

“I can see it the morning,” Brian decided and turned his face back into his pillow. 

“The world could end before the morning. Get up.” 

Brian sat up reluctantly. A pair of sneakers were thrust in his face until he took them and shoved them onto his feet, laces still dangling. John grabbed him by the elbow and shepherded him outside. 

A motorcycle gleamed under the streetlights. Chrome and gloss black paint that looked fast standing still. John ran his hands over the black leather seat in a way that was disconcertingly familiar. Brian was sure that was the exact hold that John sometimes used on his ass. 

“You...motorcycle?” He managed to put together. 

“Figured a car would be stupid in the traffic. One of the other dancers knew a guy with a busted up one. I’ve been working on restoring it. ” 

“Oh,” Brian said dumbly. Suddenly John’s weird receipts and unexplained nights out were clear. Even where his money was actually going. So much for the hundred shady scenarios Brian had pictured when he was curled up alone in bed. 

“So, you up for it?” John slung one leg over the seat and lifted his chin. 

A brisk wind cut through Brian’s pajama pants and latched onto the back of his neck. 

“Fuck yeah.” 

Though his back was freezing, Brian’s front was pressed warmly to John and he could see the city smeared into grey and glass as they picked up speed. The city gave way to the suburbs, the roar of the engine probably turning some families over in their sleep. Brian learned to lean into the turns and how to slide his hands around John’s waist to keep himself steady. 

For a wild hour, Brian wondered if John will take him back or if this was the start of some wild new adventure where they pretend to be runaway kids. Of course, they do go back because there wasn’t anyone to run away from anymore. No one waiting, but their own tangled problems. 

“Adulthood would be easier if it came with supervillains,” Brian grumbled into John’s neck as they found a parking space near their apartment. 

“I’m not going to wear tights for you, genius,” John snarled, but it wound through a laugh that Brian could feel from his groin to his shoulder, so that was all right. 

The motorcycle replaced Brian’s morning bus commute. John woke up with him now though he staunchly refused to go running. Instead, he’d make breakfast with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth so that the oatmeal might or might not have ash in it. 

“That’s so fucking foul,” Brian had complained the first time he got a mouthful. 

“That is a Bender family recipe,” John flattened a hand against his chest as if wounded. 

“That doesn’t surprise me at all.” 

John only had the one cigarette a day and Brian couldn’t quite bring himself to get angry about it. Ashy oatmeal was still more filling that the glass of orange juice he’d been having for breakfast for years. Besides if he didn’t bitch, John would drive him to work and Brian relished the ride through the dense streets. 

“Who’s the hottie with the bike?” Melissa in reception asked him eventually. She was the company gossip and Brian had the word ‘roommate’ half-formed at the back of his throat before he caught himself. 

“That’s my boyfriend,” he mumbled.

“Oh,” she cocked her head to one side as if getting a new angle on him entirely. “Really?” 

“Really.” 

“I’ve never met a real gay person.” 

“Was it everything you imagined it to be?” 

She seemed to get the question seriously. 

“I thought there’d be more glitter.” 

And all Brian could do was laugh. Melissa, bless her, eventually laughed with him. And maybe he was wrong about her gossiping because no one else ever showed a trace of knowing about John. Brian bought Melissa flowers on every major holiday for that. 

Other people started to trickle into their sealed up world. Brian came home from work to find George on his couch, talking animatedly to John about workman’s comp. 

“We’re not regular employees,” John was saying weary around the eyes. The antivirals got to him some days worse than others with their myriad of side effects. “What court would give a shit even if we did sue?” 

“They don’t have to give a shit,” Brian sat down on the coffee table. “They do have to have to obey the law.” 

“And who’s going to represent someone like Shawn, huh?” John challenged. 

Shawn, Brian figured out eventually, was the thin young man who had fussed over John when he got sick all those months ago. Brian liked Shawn with his sly smile and fast mouth. 

“What happened to him?” 

“That piece of shit manager,” George shook his head, “we told him and told him that that steps up to the stage were rotting. Shawn went right through one yesterday, broke his leg and tore up his skin. Doctor says he can’t work for at least six weeks.” 

“Okay,” Brian looked to John, who looked right back at him. With hope. Like...like Brian might have some kind of clue more than him how to handle this. “ I’ll talk to our company lawyer tomorrow. Let him earn his pay and get some advice. I’ll be vague.” 

The lawyer passed him onto another lawyer and that lawyer told Brian it wouldn’t be a short process, but they’d probably win at trial. 

“It’s just...he’s got no where to be right now, you know?” George sighed when Brian offered this kernel of news.

Brian looked to John. John said nothing, moved not a muscle in his face, but his shoulders shifted under his sweatshirt, a line of tension pulled taut. 

“He can stay on our couch,” Brian shrugged as if he could loosen the knot for John’s abused muscles. 

“Whatever,” John muttered, but his barely there smile emerged from the rough. 

Shawn was a small person with small needs as it turned out. He didn’t complain about sleeping on the couch even with his injury. Instead, he burrowed under a pile of blankets that he’d brought with him and made Brian sloppy sandwiches to bring to work. 

“Gotta do something,” he said. His voice tended toward the breathy which Brian assumed was an affectation ala Marilyn Monroe. “To say thank you.” 

“It’s just a couch,” Brian shrugged it away, but he took the sandwiches the same way he still took Bender’s two hundred dollars every month. Hell, he even ate the damn things sometimes, soggy bread and all. 

Two weeks into Shawn’s tenancy, Brian walked past the open bathroom door. Did a doubletake and walked backward. Shawn, swaddled in a white terrycloth bathrobe that swallowed him whole, was staring into the medicine cabinet like it was a portal into hell. 

“You okay?” Brian asked, then realized exactly what Shawn was looking at: the army of orange bottles with ‘John Bender’ printed neatly on them along with dosage and instructions. The orange flag of illness planted defiantly among razors and deodorant. Why hadn’t he realized that Shawn would eventually look there? Did it matter? 

“It’s only...” Shawn sighed before Brian could conjure up anything else. Digging into the robe’s pocket, Shawn produced a three orange bottles. “The things that we don’t talk about, huh?” 

“Yeah,” Brian leaned against the doorframe, too heavy to stand. “...yeah.” 

When Shawn left on his healed leg, he took with him the pile of blankets, the handful of pills and Brian’s fallback lunch plans. John looked at the empty couch with his lips pressed in a line. 

Two days later, a girl was perched on the edge of one of the cushions when Brian got home. She looked fourteen though she’d turned out to be seventeen and had eyes as wide as the moon. 

“This is Belinda,” John came out of the kitchen with a bowl of cereal that she fell upon ravenously. “She tried to seduce me down an alleyway without a condom.” 

Belinda’s eyes went even wider and she looked frantically at Brian with some denial at the back of her throat. It went unvoiced. 

“Um,” Brian crossed his arms over her chest. “So....” 

“So she’s staying here until she figures out how not to be a dumbass.” 

“Right,” Brian bit his lip, not sure if it was holding back a scream or laugh. “Okay then.” 

It never occurred to Brian to suggest they send her back to whatever home she’d run from. He knew all too well the kind of things that thrust vulnerable children into the world. Belinda stayed longer than Shawn, enrolling in a GED class under Brian’s insistence and getting a job on John’s. 

“I think I want to be a cop,” she confessed over her open books when Brian gave her a late night cup of coffee. “Is that weird?” 

“Why would it be weird?” He asked around a yawn. 

“Dunno. I mean...” She shrugged. “My Daddy was a cop once. And he was a rat bastard. But...” 

“Chicago’s finest would be lucky to have you,” he said neutrally. 

She went to the academy with her GED clenched tight in one hand and their sofa went empty again as she moved her things in with the only other female cadet in her year. 

“We should get a bigger place,” Brian decided. 

“What we?” John raised his chin. “I just pay the rent.” 

“Oh yeah?” Brian rolled his eyes. “So if I move out, you’re just going to stay here? Get another roommate?” 

“Maybe,” John didn’t drop the pose, but he did roll his eyes right back. “You know what they say about asses and assumptions.” 

“Everyone’s got both?” Brian guessed. 

They didn’t leave their neighborhood. It would’ve felt odd to gentrify, even if it might have been more convenient in some ways. Instead, Brian led John to a rickety townhouse with a broken window just two blocks away. 

“This is a dive,” John pronounced with relish. “A real fucking mess.” 

“Yep,” Brian beamed. 

To no one’s surprise, Brian wasn’t much use to fixing the place up. That was fine, he liked leaving in the morning and coming home to the smell of plaster, copper and John’s sweat. George helped with the tiling and Shawn proved dexterous with wiring. Belinda, body hardening with training, was happy to be a second pair of hands. 

The house was still a mess, even fully renovated, with odd staircases and windows placed at random. The wind blew through cracks and cooled the place unseasonably in the winter, but it was airy in the summer and John built out a balcony that was probably illegal. He sat out there year round, legs dangling between the bars casting smudgy shadows onto the street below. 

They ticked up two and a half years since that night John had stripped back into Brian’s life, before Brian came home smelling like beer far later than he normally would. It had just been a work party, nothing fun, but John eyed him suspiciously as he came in the door. 

“What?” Brian hung up his coat on the hooks John had drilled into the wall and laid his shoes in the neat row that John insisted on destroying each morning with kicked off sneakers. 

“You get lucky?” John asked, hard edge in his voice. 

“No,” Brian stared at him. “Why would I....What?” 

“You could’ve been. I mean, nothing’s stopping you.” 

It hadn’t occurred to Brian. Not since the first time he’d licked the strip of skin just over John’s black silk panties for the first time. He fantasized, sure, he wasn’t dead, but with none of the urgency of making fantasy reality. He noticed other men, admired a good ass or broad shoulders, but none of it made him want to reach out and grab. None of it made him want. 

What he wanted was to crawl over John, even prickly, angry and defensive John. John, who even now, coiled in sweatpants and a tank top with acid waiting on the tip of his tongue, still made Brian want to clamor over every invisible fence and wall of thorns to brave that potential snake bite for the chance to get close and get his hands on him. 

“I didn’t. I don’t,” Brian licked his lips. “Probably won’t.” 

“No, huh?” John searched his face with daggered eyes. “That a promise?” 

“Sure. How bout you?” 

“Hm,” the long line of John’s body unfurled. “Guess I can give it a shot.” 

And really why bother with in sickness and in health when Brian already tracked doctors appointments, t-cell counts and prescriptions? Why mouth nonsense about the parting of death when it breathed down the back of their necks? 

Instead, they had a guest room to install John’s collection of lost souls that drifted in and out of their lives, sometimes removing valuables or returning trust with poison. More often though it earned them friends and allies. 

When John woke up wincing from another pulled muscle and declared, 

“I’m not going to work again. Ever, maybe.” 

“Okay,” Brian shrugged it off, “What do you want to do instead? Cause you’re not freeloading on my dime.” 

“Please. You wouldn’t tell your ass from your elbow without me sticking labels on ‘em,” John shoved him back on the bed and bit ruthlessly at his collarbone. 

John tried a few things, spent a few months aimless and then found himself frogmarched by Belinda to the community college with instructions to “become a social worker already. You think I enjoy forging paperwork to cover up your superheroing?” 

“Bitch,” John grumbled, but he went and still slapped two hundred dollars on the kitchen counter every month like Brian might suddenly realize that John really was freeloading. Forget that the money came from the financial aid that Brian had arranged for him. Apparently it was the principal of the thing. 

It was an adventure getting John back to school. He hated the structure of classes, found flaws with every professor and resented his place among an ocean of pimply face teenagers. Headaches became a common complaint until Brian finally put two and two together. 

“You need glasses, dumbass,” Brian determined. 

“No,” John squared off, legs spread wide and arms crossed. 

“You know that the textbooks aren’t supposed to make you squint like you’re staring into the sun, right?” 

“I don’t squint.” 

“Uh huh.” 

“I don’t need your goddamn condescension,” John slammed the front door hard enough on the way out that the walls rattled. 

The engine revved on John’s bike and Brian could track his progress down the street to going....going....gone. Brian looked down at the mess of books and the spiky scrawl of John’s handwriting with it’s painstaking notes. The textbook looked interesting, but Brian resisted picking it up. For the first time in many years, he wondered about the others. Was Claire sitting in a well appointed home somewhere with a glass of wine wondering how she’d wound up there? Was Allison tying herself to a tree and hoping that there was someone waiting at home after the cameras left? Did Andy let the whistle drop between his lips and wonder why he bothered to make an effort? 

Their ghosts trailed him to bed, keeping him company while he stared up at the ceiling and listened to the hum of the refrigerator. The sun shook him loose from the sheets and drew him through his morning routine. When he came back from his run, dripping sweat and released fury, the house remained stubbornly empty. 

For lack of a choice, he went to work and read through lines of code until his eyes blurred and his fingers ached from their stiff claw over the keyboard. He ignored the clock, prepared to go into overtime for the first time in years. 

There was a knock on his door. 

“Come in,” he told his keyboard. 

“So this is how the other half works?” 

Brian whipped his head up, heart suddenly beating off kilter. There was John, leaning in the doorway with his hair windswept, swathed in clothes that mostly originated from Brian’s closet and a pair of wireframe glasses magnifying his bloodshot eyes. 

“Hey,” Brian leaned back in his chair, arms crossed over his chest. He doubted he was conveying the same amount of casual calm that John was pulling off. 

“So it turns out that my eyes are for shit,” a wry smile turned up the edges of his lips. 

“Who knew?” 

“Yeah, yeah, wise guy,” John dropped a paper bag on Brian’s desk. It smelled like Chinese food. “You get the Eggroll of Correctness. For being an egghead.” 

“Nice apology,” Brian dug into the bag, suddenly starving. 

“I’m not sorry,” John said sullenly, for all the world eighteen again as he slumped into the guest chair on the other side of the desk. 

“Fine,” Brian cracked open a container of wanton soup. “But don’t...” 

“Don’t what?” The glasses weren’t bad. They didn’t even change John’s overall look very much. Something about how they sat on the bridge of his nose in challenge to gravity. 

“Don’t disappear, okay?” 

John tilted back an extra degree, head lolling against the back of the office chair. There was a water stain in the corner of the room. Brian had always thought it looked a little like a drunk’s drawing of a cat. John stared at it now, the long sprawl of him in repose. 

Brian ate his eggroll. 

“I can’t promise not to die,” John finally said and the food went cold and heavy in Brian’s stomach. He clenched his fist around the thin wrapper, a shattering of noisy protest. Over the edges of the wire rimmed glasses, John looked at him with deep exhaustion. “You gonna help me with this college thing or what?” 

“Don’t think you’re getting out of writing papers.” 

Brian wrote most of John’s papers. He felt guilty about it at first and certainly annoyed, but John always presented him with outlines and notes, along with dinner or a blowjob or a folded basket of laundry. After awhile it was just something they did. Of course, time had dulled Brian’s scholarly edge and John would often wave B plus papers at him with a chiding tongue cluck. 

The nature of their guest room visitors shifted slightly, edging more towards fellow students between places or escaping insane roommates or worse, crazy boyfriends. Brian learned how to put in a stitch or two while John poured booze down their throats to numb many kinds of agony. 

John’s T-cells were dinner conversation and his black panties stacked neatly in their underwear drawer, edging out Brian’s sensible Fruit of the Loom. They wore each other’s clothes and argued over whether or not they should march in the Pride parade. Neither of them actually wanted to, but John liked finding a side of an argument and sticking to it until Brian jumped him to make him shut up. They wound up going anyway, standing in the crowd. Halfway through, John laced his arm around Brian’s waist and drew him up close. 

“What?” Brian leaned into him, expecting some whispered comment or explanation. 

“Idiot,” John snorted and rested the sharp point of his chin on Brian’s shoulder. 

The parade went on, a kaleidoscope of color, triumphant shouts and music. The crowd pushed and shoved around them, but John anchored them, standing his ground with his snarl and wide planted stance. There were two silver hairs nestled in among the dark brown that caught the light whenever John tilted his head to catch some detail or another. 

Silver hairs and silver rimmed glasses, soft cotton and worn through denim, those were the things John Bender was made of now. Time, Brian thought, pulled strange tricks. It sent rebellion and pain through a washing machine until everything lost its hard edges and clear meanings. 

“Do you ever think about the others?” Brian asked as they made their way back through the crowd. 

“What others?” John’s attention was elsewhere, eyes scanning the crowd for potential dangers. 

“Allison and Claire and Andy.” 

“No,” two little kids pushed past them, their laughter trilling through the crowd. “Why?” 

“I wonder what they’re like now.” 

“The same. People don’t change much,” John pronounced. “They can’t.” 

“I don’t know about that,” Brian leaned into John’s side, escaping the sharp spikes on a woman’s leather vest. “I’ve changed.” 

“No,” John laughed. “You haven’t.” 

“Oh, come on! I’m not just some nerdy helpless kid.” 

“Who said you ever were?” John rolled his eyes. 

“Uh. You, actually.” 

“Well, why the fuck were you listening to me?” John flashed him a toothy grin. 

“Asshole.” 

“See? No one changes. Once an asshole, always an asshole.” 

“Yeah, I see it now,” Brian laughed. 

John’s arm stayed firmly around Brian’s waist as they washed up into bar filled with revelers. They split a beer, passing the bottle between them. The faintest taste of nicotine lingered on the lip when Brian took a sip. The bar stool was loose, unmoored from the floor. 

“You two been together long?” The bartender shouted over the noise as he slid a second beer into Brian’s open hand. 

“Not long enough,” the reply tripped over his tongue and beside him, John laughed, a shaking motion that vibrated through Brian’s ribs. The stool wavered under him. “Not nearly long enough.”


End file.
